Awareness, Consciousness and Spirituality Blog

A Different Approach to Thinking

Life is a “thinking energy”, you as a soul/being as well as you as the physical body (with the heart & brain as the intelligence centers) are a form of life-energy and hence have this inherent nature of being a “thinking” entity. Living from a place of wholeness has nothing to do with the “end of thinking”, rather it’s about letting go of the deluded, misguided, or imbalanced, way of thinking. The whole practice of trying to silence your thoughts is one of the most misguided practices you can ever follow to come to a place of wholeness – trying to silence your thoughts is just an act of suppression, it can give you some temporary relief, just like a drug would, but it also keeps you to from resolving the conflicts/problems that you may be dealing with in your life. There are people who have spent years trying to silence their “thinking”, through the force of will, and all they manage to accomplish (temporarily) is a false state of dull peace, which has a highly unnatural feel to it and requires constant effort to maintain – these practices are ways of “disciplining” yourself unnaturally, and they accomplish nothing towards inner-freedom, creativity, alignment and conscious living. The problem is not with “thinking”, the problem is in the approach we developed towards thinking, which is simply a part of the conditioning/training we receive from a largely struggle-based society.

There are two ways in which you can think, as a being

1. Relaxed awareness (or relaxed-thinking)

2. Focused thinking

Very few of us have consciously aligned with the mode of “relaxed awareness”, and hence we don’t realize the immense potential this approach has towards bringing new solutions and resolving inner conflicts. Most of us are rooted in “focused thinking”, and in many cases our focus is on negativity rather than solutions and hence we just end up creating a momentum of negativity within us (which eventually shapes into a physical reality) while standing in resistance to allowing a balanced/wholeness-based solution. Focused thinking is also a very powerful way of “creating” solutions, but only when your focus is on solutions. It’s important to understand the “right way”, of using the potential of focused thinking, in order to lead a consciously effective life. The way I see it, unless you develop the capacity for relaxed-thinking, it’s very difficult to align with the right way of focused thinking – you can see this in people who keep trying to focus on positive thoughts, and end up living in fear of problems, conflicts and challenges.

Since the capacity for relaxed-thinking is a required pre-requisite, for the capacity to use the potential of focused thinking, I will discuss the mechanics of relaxed-thinking first, and follow it up with the mechanics of the “right way” of using focused thinking.

The approach of relaxed awareness

“Relaxed awareness” is just a term I coined up because it gives an accurate description of the state of openness involved when you align with this mode of thinking – it can also be referred to as “relaxed-thinking”. Relaxed-awareness is a part of the ability to be “allowing” of what arises in the form of thoughts, and emotions, without trying to suppress it and without trying to force a solution. You can try this right now, just a for a minute let go of making an “effort” to think, and just let thinking happen if it happens. The pointer is – don’t “try” to think, don’t try to solve anything, don’t try to look for solutions, don’t try to get rid of what arises, just “be”. I hope you understand that I am not asking you to “trance out” into some passive state, neither am I asking you to be “focused” on anything, it’s just about “being” aware without the need to protect yourself from any thought and without the need to hold on to any thought. There is such a thing as become “passive”, which is just another escape mechanism, and there is such a thing as “fear-based focus” which is also another protection mechanism. Relaxed-thinking is not meant to be an escape mechanism to got into some “lulled” state of daze, neither is it about focusing, it’s about actively “being” without trying to make an effort at trying to “be”.

It’s possible that you are not able to get the pointer I am conveying here, and it’s because you may be trying to understand, the approach of relaxed-thinking, from your past training of either trying to “struggle” in some way or trying to detach in some way – which are just two extremes of the same thing, fear-based living. Even when I give the pointer of “just be”, it can be misinterpret as “trying” to be, and then you just sit and keeping making an effort to “be”, and since all your energy is focused on this effort you cannot be relaxed, and hence you cannot really “allow” what’s arising naturally in your mind. Just let go of effort, without going into a state of being “passive” – it’s a middle ground. Below are a few pointers on knowing if you are doing relaxed-thinking the right way.

– You are not trying to escape, suppress or deny any of the thoughts that arise

– You are not “trying” to think, but you are allowing thinking to happen, in any way that it wants to happen

– You are open to all the emotions that arise in you including stark feelings of fear, restlessness or irritation

– You are not distracting yourself in any way through any external stimulus (It’s very helpful if you do relaxed-thinking with closed eyes, initially)

– You are not trying to become “passive” or detached. I can only give this as a pointer, it’s up to you to be honest with yourself on whether you are trying to get passive as a means to go into a lulled sense of peace, as an escape or as some “spiritual idea”.

– You are not trying to be aware, neither are you attempting to watch thoughts rigidly, if your awareness goes towards any thought, or feeling, you allow it, and when it lets go of a thought or a feeling, you allow that also – you are not trying to control what your awareness rests on.

– You are not trying to relax or feel good, you are not trying to be fearless, you are not trying to feel some “extraordinary” state.

The tendency of the mind is to think “repetitively” about any thought that feels like a concern, problem or challenge. The mind also thinks repetitively about its true desires, preferences and interests (when I say “the mind” I am including everything – the thinking of the heart, the brain, the being). The fact that the mind has the tendency to keep repeating whatever it feels is “important” for it, ensures that the state of “relaxed-thinking” is not a state of denial – if something is important to the mind, it will keep repeating the thought unless a solution is found or unless it loses importance through an understanding or perspective. So, don’t worry about being in “denial” when you are connected with relaxed-thinking – if you are not trying to be passive and detached, the state of relaxed-thinking will never be a state of denial.

The reason why the state of relaxed-thinking brings solutions (or brings wisdom) is because in this state “you” are not trying to think from your past conditioning which may be rooted in imbalances or delusions, rather, you are allowing the intelligence of the wholeness of life to assist you in bringing a solution/balance to the thoughts of your mind. This way you are connecting with a far deeper intelligence than the mechanical intelligence of conditioned thinking. In many cases, when you connect with relaxed-thinking you may see yourself being automatically guided towards solutions (for example, you may just feel an inspiration to search something in google which ultimately takes you towards a certain solution). The other advantages of relaxed-thinking are as mentioned below

– You develop a sense of inner power, where you become free of the “grip” of your mind’s thinking (since you develop the capacity to stop “reacting” to your mind’s thoughts). The more you connect with relaxed-thinking the more open your being feels from the strong-hold of the mind’s thinking momentum.

– As you practice relaxed-thinking the mind momentum keeps reducing and finally comes to balanced-levels, in case you had a high momentum going for you before. The momentum reduces not only because your mind finds solutions and understanding, but also because you are no longer fueling the momentum through giving it your narrow focus.

– You gain access to perspectives that are rooted in wisdom and wholeness, since you are no longer holding on to an egoic perspective alone.

– Emotional accumulation of the past starts getting released when you connect with relaxed-thinking, this is because you are no longer suppressing the emotional-release that arises naturally, and you (as a being) are no longer re-creating the emotions through unconscious identification which thought-patterns relating to them.

– You start gaining an inner stability to handle any challenge because you start finding a confidence in life’s intelligence to bring you solutions in this mode of being “resistance-free”.

– You feel more in tune with your intuition and wisdom

Relaxed-thinking may feel like a completely new domain to you. It’s like developing a new habit, and it will take time before you start getting used to it, and start seeing its potential/power in bringing solutions. For a while, you may just need to work on getting to terms with the natural state of relaxed-thinking. Don’t get too impatient, don’t try to “get it right” – both of these mindsets will hamper you from truly being connected with the openness that’s needed for relaxed-thinking.

Using focused thinking the right way

“Focused thinking” is when you consciously, or unconsciously, think about a particular thought/subject, giving it the fuel of your attention and interest. The first step towards using focused thinking, the right way, is to be more conscious about it. When you practice relaxed-thinking you will become aware of all the various habitual/repetitive patterns of thought that you were giving “unconscious attention” to before. You would need to release the momentum of your unconscious thinking patterns, before you can really start using focused thinking consciously – the only way to release the momentum is to become more and more rooted in relaxed-thinking (relaxed-awareness). At one point, when you’ve released the momentum of your unconscious thinking patterns, you can use relaxed-thinking and focused-thinking in a balance, both these ways of thinking are required for an optimal life.

I will reiterate that it’s very important to find a stability in “relaxed-thinking” before you can even look at using focused-thinking the right way. It is relaxed-thinking that releases the past momentum of negativity in your mind, so that it’s more conducive to a new focus. For example, you may be rooted to a struggle-based way of thinking and your mind may have a strong momentum towards this way of thinking owing to years of unconscious attention, and in this condition if you try to change your focus to a abundance-based way of thinking you will find a lot of resistance coming from the mind (because of its past momentum). When you connect with relaxed-thinking, you can allow the past momentum of your mind to ebb away, so that your mind no longer poses resistance to your conscious focus.

Once you have released the past momentum of your mind (through relaxed-awareness), you can start using focused-thinking in a conscious manner. Below are some pointers on the optimal way to use focused-thinking to align with a solution-based focus.

– Don’t focus on blame-based thoughts, it serves no purpose

– Don’t focus on the perceived “negatives” in a situation, just observe them, and then focus on what kind of growth the situation is wanting to create in you. Always focus on thinking in terms of inner growth/maturity. Introspection is a very powerful form of focused-thinking.

– Don’t keep focusing on the problem. When you have a problem, you just need to observe it once to know its there, nothing is served by constant obsessing about it. Once you see a problem, you can also see your mind formulating a “required solution” (envisioning a reality that doesn’t have this problem). Shift your focus towards this “required solution”, and keep your focused-thinking along these lines.

– Use your focused-thinking to visualize the reality you desire, and get a sense of the light and dark nature involved in this reality – the reality of life is that every situation has a light and dark nature. For example, a relationship can bring you romantic experiences, but it will also take up your time and energy. When you are aligned with the light and dark nature of a desired reality, it can manifest more smoothly, since you are exhibiting a maturity to deal with it.

– Don’t use your focused-thinking to only focus on the light nature of a reality, such a focus may seem like “positive thinking” when in truth it’s just deluded thinking because it’s also not grounded in reality and hence is in resistance to manifesting a physical reality of your desire. Such a focus can also keep you from unearthing the resistance you may have towards the actual reality of your desire.

– Focused-thinking in balance with relaxed-thinking is most optimal for bringing better solutions and dissolving inner conflicts/resistances.

Focused-thinking is a part of being a “deliberate creator”, where you make the choice towards what type of reality you want to experience. The problem is that, when a person who is deluded about life, he/she tends to think in a delusional manner and such a person can then use focused-thinking to just focus on a deluded, or misguided, image of reality – which can just become a means of living in some form of denial or ignorance. This is the reason why it’s important to first connect with relaxed-awareness, to allow yourself to transcend the grip of your mind’s imbalanced momentum while also developing a deeper understanding of reality – the more you understand the reality of life the more aligned your thinking will be. For example, when you realize that all realities, in life, have a light and dark nature, your thinking is no longer deluded, rather it starts becoming congruent with reality.

20 Comments

CarloOctober 6, 2012 at 11:47 am

Hi Sen,

Thanks for this posting, it really has made me aware about the two thinking forms.

The awakening “seed ” is opening up in me bringing awareness in my actions. I made space for the life to come inside to me and life has made space to accept me. That’s divine! Your posting are a torch light for who is “ready “. Thanks for finding your web.

GundaOctober 7, 2012 at 11:45 pm

Sen,

Well I did wonder where we were going with the “relaxed awareness” and after reading this post it now all makes sense.

abetOctober 9, 2012 at 4:04 am

this clears up a lot thanks

EllenOctober 10, 2012 at 1:34 pm

Hi Sen,
I just have a question about visualization. I don’t know if you know about mind movies. Nowadays, you can create your own mind movies where you can put in it pictures of things you want in life like your dream homes, ideal relations, experiences, cars etc and you can put your own pictures and it feels like you really own and experiencing all right now plus you can choose music to go with it so every time you watch it it triggers some emotions at the same time. I watch my own movie every night for more than 30 days (as that what they said to do). Some manifest like relationship, more positive attitude etc but the harder one like dream home, financial freedom takes a little more time I guess. What is your idea about this? Is there more that I can do to manifest this faster? What do you think? Am I doing it right?
I love your blog pls continue your good work for us who seek guidance and wisdom
Ellen

SenPost authorOctober 19, 2012 at 1:39 pm

Ellen, “deliberate creation”, via using focused thought, is a potential we have as a being made from life-energy. This potential needs to be developed and honed, mostly because we, as humans, are not used to exercising our power of deliberate creation – it has not been a part of our conditioning for so long. We are more conditioned to focus on “physical work” rather than work on our thinking. Thinking is also a form of action, in fact it’s a very powerful form of action with respect to manifesting desires. “Physical work” is also required, and is a channel for manifestation, for some desires to manifest – but it’s secondary, what’s primary is to use our “thinking” to be a match to the desire and allow the physical work to come from a place of inspiration once our thoughts are aligned. As I said, our civilization is yet to develop the mindset of using thought for deliberate creation, so the mass belief system is in contradiction to this way of manifesting. Your own belief system is bound to be influenced by the mass belief system, and your mind is bound to have thoughts of doubt about the process of deliberate creation through focused thinking. It’s about moving beyond these doubts, and to start exercising this potential of using focused thought for creation. It will take time for the mind to get used to this form of thinking, our minds are mostly attuned to thinking in terms of struggle, physical work, limitation, lack-consciousness, guilt about ease, guilt about comfort, unworthiness etc, and this way of thinking is embedded deeply in our mind due to the upbringing, our cellular memory acquires from our gene pool (the struggle based mindset of your ancestors and parents) as well as due to our past lifetimes of conditioning as a soul who has been incarnating on Earth. It will take time to really tune-in to this form of creating via focused thinking, especially with respect to desires that are taken to be “hard” to manifest by the mind – you used the label “harder ones” for your desire for a house or financial freedom, and subconsciously that’s also your belief and it’s normal to have this belief because of our conditioning towards material possession and material abundance. A relationship may have been easier for you to manifest because you may have no real resistance about it, your mind might feel “deserving” of a relationship far more than material abundance.

Mind movies, or any technique of visualization, are ways of developing “focused thinking” and that’s a benefit you might get from these techniques. But what’s really important is to get a deeper sense of your belief with regards to possibility of manifestation, to get sense of the doubts in your mind, to get a sense of a feeling of worthiness you have about these desires. Also, it’s required to see if you have any resistance to the dark nature aspects of the desired reality, remember that all realities in life have a light and dark nature component, and we may not have resistance to light nature but we may be holding several resistances to the dark nature aspects. You can read the post – light and dark nature of desired reality

rafaelOctober 10, 2012 at 4:02 pm

Is it normal for this practice to feel like you are supressing to a certain extent? When I do it a big part of me feels like I am in denial almost like I am running away from the thoughts.. Is this normal?

SenPost authorOctober 19, 2012 at 1:45 pm

Rafael, the state of allowing is the opposite of the state of denial or suppression. In the state of allowing, you consciously allow your mind and emotions to have the freedom of expression, and if your mind has a momentum of negativity it will express negativity, you are not suppressing or denying or contradicting this movement. What you are doing is you are not “identifying” with it in terms of being lost to it, or buying into it, or giving it your belief – you are just allowing of it, without suppression or identification. If you feel like you are running away from your thoughts, it means that you have the fear of really allowing them in your consciousness. In a true state of allowing you will never feel like you are running away from thoughts, you feel fearless towards allowing thoughts in the mind knowing that you have the awareness to not give it unconscious identification, and that you can consciously see through the repetitive patterns.

rajaOctober 10, 2012 at 11:00 pm

Hello,

I read your articles recently and it makes a lot of sense. I have started the journey to a state of allowing. I would like to clarify certain experiences I had. Sometimes when I try to just “be” I can feel something like a blob of energy stuck inside me and when i continue in that state it seems to be melting up..sometimes i feel twitching sensations..sensations as if energy is disipiating..along the spine..also sometimes there is some tingling sensations in the brain. Is this all part of the built up energy dissipiating? Do you think that there is stuck energy in our organs? when the stuck energy releases does the organ return to a balance if it was imbalanced?

As we become more lighter, will these sensations reduce? is there a typical progression?

Raja

SenPost authorOctober 19, 2012 at 1:58 pm

Raja, what you describe are quite normal during the process of emotional release, and it’s also true that emotional energy is stored up in the body, in the cells and their cellular memory. There is definite feeling of the body becoming “lighter” within, as the release happens and these sensations lose their intensity, and in fact their presence itself is no longer around.

A man once wrote (you have to evolve from
a thought self to a no self which is a Cosmic self without any identification at all.) This is what you seam to be saying, and I like it. Thank you much.

KellyOctober 11, 2012 at 4:31 am

I’m so glad I found your site!!! I was searching for some info on negative/catastrophic thinking and an article you wrote appeared and so I clicked on your blog here. I feel a great sense of hope after reading just a few of your articles. I have suffered from panic attacks for 15 years and I really was not aware that I could control my negative thoughts as you say. I finally realize that it’s my negative thinking, which has become very habitual, that is completely causing my panic attacks and me feeding into/believing my irrational thoughts. I can’t wait to read more of your articles as it all seems to make sense to me now! Thank you!

AarobnOctober 12, 2012 at 1:26 pm

God Bless you man. It took me so long to realize that truly letting yourself be the self that Existence itself has created you to be is the only way to live life.

IzOctober 13, 2012 at 6:04 pm

Both of them came to be in the valley. Each knew of the others existence. They saw each other, even from their great distance apart. They contemplated each other, physical appearance, motive and purpose. It was so cloudy, and the valley grew bigger and bigger as they stood there, staring back at each other. After some time, one approached the other, placed his hands on the back of his head, closed his eyes and simply gave…

a cheerful grin.

The other, astonished, stepped back with a look of confusion and whispered

“Why… why after all this time, have you…”

The young man opened his eyes. His smile disappeared turning into a downward glance of puzzlement. There was a glint of openness; his grin came back.

“It just felt right”, he said.

His smile was even wider now.

The other looked at this young man’s smile, his face contorted to contempt.

“Iago”, he whispered.

The young man now looked squarely at the other. He stuck his hand out in a clenched fist.

“The names Zee”.

The less trustful one’s eyes completely widened.

“But my name is Zee also… your… your me?”

There was a pause for a moment as both faced each other. It couldn’t be helped. They began to laugh.

They just couldn’t stop; it really was too funny.

Silence finally fell between them, but things were different now. Zee had the same open eyes as his counterpart. He looked up to the sky and then around through the vast valley. His head then turned back, staring at his friend’s clenched hand. He raised his arm with a smile, and bumped fists.

So lately, I’ve become more aware of some of the habits my mind has by just watching where it goes, not only when I’m alone, but also when I’m outside living life. For example, when I eat something good, my mind will immediately imagine getting a second helping of whatever I was eating … before I even finish the first helping!… which is pretty stupid. This will then move me to get seconds after firsts. Another habit my mind has is to take the voice of other people and criticize/ accuse me about pretty pointless stuff, and then my own voice will argue back stating how what the “voice of other people” said is wrong. Why does my mind take these other voices, why am I so defensive? Anyways, for quite a long time I never really noticed them, but just by allowing and being more aware, I’ve begun to see these habits clearly. Now that I know of these mind habits, should I just keep allowing and they’ll just slowly die away? I don’t believe they are naturally how my mind is or at least i hope so, I mean, there both really stupid habits. Is just watching with disinterest or allowing really gonna bring them to an end? Even now allowing is something I’m struggling to understand. I must release the feelings that leave me imbalanced, so to do that, I must truly feel them but not be interested them. This is a difficult pointer for me. At the same time, I wonder if their is another aspect of allowing where I take attention to these habits in my mind in an attempt to find where they originally came from, from my past, my childhood. Is this correct? I guess I could just use some guidance here.

YvanNovember 16, 2012 at 8:13 am

Hello Sen

i would like to congratulate you for this article because after reading it i think i get very very well what you are talking about and it seems to me this is the key to just everything in life.
However we are different beings, and i would like to share with you how i “explained” this mechanism for myself so you could tell me what do you think of my perceptions, because i still have some difficulties with this mechanism.

To me, the mind is a powerful energy shaper and whatever we give attention to we reinforce. The trick being that when we don’t understand fully in our hearth the nature of reality, we often get caught in the process of fighting against our perceptions of fear, or guilt, trying to master them by understanding. And when we do that, we do not often realise we are unconsciouscly focusing on the negative energy/ perceptions even if we try to prove them wrong, or think about a subject in either way.

“what you resist persist”

But i also remarked something, it is that sometimes we create what you call a “momentum” around a subject, and for a while we are unable to think of this matter without reinforcing the momentum. So the momentum has to dissolve so we can start perceiving the subject in neutral or positives ways. i wrapped my mind around it so many times that sometimes, i feel like a subject of thought is going wrong in my mind and i have no other choices to “drop” it immediatly. It is kind of frustrating, but it seems like you must first give up and allow your negative distorted perception before being able to perceive it other way, and it can take time…
I used this “strategy” for years on some painful subjects of my life and i must say it has bring awesome results. It is like the subject who previously seemed so awful months ago became soft and sweet. Like if it was a very hot potatoe, and became colder and colder when the time passed and you stopped catching it, and the blocages dissolve.

Also, this lead me to a kind of thinking i’m not mastering yet, but i would like to know how you perceive that.
I feel like, whatever the subject, you decide the impact it has upon you and how you perceive it and there is no reality on this subject outside what you decide it to be.
And this whatever the subject. No right or wrong, no dangerous or safe, no evil or good… You set the rules in your mind but also in your outter reality. I say this because i remarked that long time ago, i used to do some things and feel very guilty about it (nothing really bad don’t worry!), and it seemed like it was and like the outside world was reproaching me this. Time passed, and i did what i call non resisting, and this same thing seemed totally neutral to me, and the world wasn’t reacting the same way.
To finish this, i would like to say that it is like if sometimes you get very scared because of what the people think [“mass beliefs”] and it is hard for you to get through it. But if you allow, it disappears and you really become able to perceive other ways.
Like for diseases, i know this from multiple experiences and i know how it feels like when you dissolve/ get through the fear based realities on disease. (you can’t heal, it’s terrible, you need a doctor etc….). it is scary to ignore all this but in the end if you follow your guts it is very powerfull.

Thanks, waiting for your reply

SenPost authorNovember 20, 2012 at 9:20 pm

Yvan, wisdom is something that’s always accessible in a state of awareness when one is not lost to an imbalanced momentum. Of course every subject does have a right and wrong (not as a judgment of morality but as a balanced response or imbalanced response) and it’s your wisdom that determines what you follow, and wisdom is not something rigid (a rigid set of rules) but a very dynamic intelligence relative to the situation or circumstance. You felt guilty about something that was possibly just a normal/natural deal in your physicality because of some narrow judgments/hang-ups that you may have had about it which you were identified with and hence were not privy to the intelligence of wisdom. As you grew in awareness you connected more with wisdom and were able to see through these hang-ups and hence felt neutral of the same thing.

RomanDecember 9, 2012 at 11:28 pm

I have been watching youtube videos on spirituality and read books like “The Power of Now” and for the first time, i am really getting this “relaxed awareness” thing. I always tried to hard, to stay as “i am” and trying to live in the now, was so much effort, i lost so much enery doing this, no i am not wondering since you say it is focused thinking. It is just a joke how much i actually misperceived the teaching. Your site is really clearing it all up, and for the first time now in the last days i understand, what it actually means, to be aware. Even to a point where i notice that my shoulders are tensed up all the time and when i read “relaxed awareness”, i relax my body and forget about all ideas and it seems like i am getting it now. Also i am having lots of anxieties and fear i tried to utterly hard to become aware of them, but it was like fueling them with attention again. I used to have problems, sleeping in my room in total darkness and i left the light on my TV on. Now in the last days i just can “relax into” the experience and for the first time it just feels real and accepted.
This whole awareness thing can be so easily missunderstood.
Thank you for sharing all this things, it just came to the right time.

tonymontanaMarch 21, 2013 at 4:21 am

Hey sen, I been reading your post for a while now and I must day im really fascinated by your words and knowledge. It really helped me out, I had post traumatic stress disorder for about a year now and keep having the same images pop up. I been using your technique of relax awareness and try not to get involve with any thought, but sometimes it just come back and my mind get involve in it again, any tips?

WilfredApril 18, 2013 at 10:43 pm

Hello sen. Please, whats your take on “DAY DREAMING”.. Each time am listening to an interesting music, i used to day-dream.. Recently, a part of my mind has been telling that its wrong and another part telling me that nothen is wrong with it… Please doese “DAY-DREAMING” in anyway fuels/adds to the momentum of the mind?